What is Revenge?
by Tabitha Caine
Summary: AU! Written 1st person, thort it wud be a challenge! I've kept sum things the same as the show, but have change sum. Horatio's married with daughter, how does he handle it when shes taken? PLEASE REVIEW! PLEASE REVIEW!PLEASE REVIEW! IF YOU READ PLZ REVIEW
1. Chapter 1

**WHAT IS REVENGE?**

**Disclaimer:** I do not own any of the recognised characters of CSI. They belong to the creators and writers at CBS! However the characters that are unfamiliar do belong to moi! Hope you enjoy!

**AN:** This ff is a little different as it is written in the first person. Me! I thought that I would give it a go! Hope you like it.

**Chapter 1**

"Mommy, I'm going to school…" Tabitha shouted as she collected her packed lunch from the fridge. Walking to the front door to meet her, I tiredly kissed my daughter on the forehead. Her strawberry blonde hair and her ocean blue eyes made her the image of her father.

"Have a good day sweetie; Daddy will pick you up from Jessie's after cheerleading." Her father didn't have much of a childhood, with his mom dying and having to bring up his brother, so to make up for it (as he put it), he allowed Tabitha to do near enough anything she wanted.

"Bye Mommy," running down the garden path, my angel jumped into the black SUV, which was waiting for her. Waving avidly, Tabby's 'goodbye' was drowned out by Calleigh's toot of the car horn.

"I'll see you tomorrow," was the message from one of my best friends. Closing the front door, I wandered about the house. Doing a general tidy, I collected the clothes that my daughter and husband manage to leave lying around. Sorting them from what wasn't dirty to what was, my next stop was the kitchen. I set the dishwasher and washing machine on quiet cycles. Finally I was able to get back to bed. The 3 hours sleep before Tabitha's alarm went off was not going to keep me going for much longer. As I wandered up the stairs, my thoughts were lead to my own mother and how she managed to cope with 3 children and a husband.

As Horatio sat quietly in the common room, with his fellow CSIs; whom he had work with for many years; joined him for morning coffee. Eric Delko, resident law enforcement SCUBA instructor started the morning conversation.

"Any of you see the news last night?" He enquired as an unhealthy amount of sugar was poured into is decaf latte. Replying that she was too busy helping their son with his homework, Calleigh continued to multitask, making her breakfast and read the morning paper. Ryan Wolfe, the new trace expert, who had just recently returned from his second spell at College, informed that the baseball game had unfortunately taken priority. Horatio being the last to answer informed the crew what Delko was trying to get at.

"I caught the end of the report. It was something about the police dragging up the remains of an unidentified female out of the glades."

"Ooh I bet the night shift had had fun with that one!" Calleigh cooed as she layered cream cheese over her toasted bagel. There was an unspoken rivalry between the night and day shifts.

"Well all I know is that they couldn't be bothered to call in their own ballistics, so they kept Claire here till 5am going over the rounds that they pulled out of the body. Put it this way she wasn't a happy bunny, as she would say." The whole room jumped at the sound of Horatio's cell phone going off.

"Caine…? WHAT! When? Are you sure? Have you called Claire? We are on our way." Sitting quietly on the edge of the chair, Horatio's face went very pale.

"This lab is not working any other case today." The atmosphere went dull and concerned.

"Horatio? Who was that? What's wrong?" Calleigh asked. She knew that he didn't issue a one case day for no reason.

"Horatio?"

"That was Frank. There was a phone call into the PD. Tabitha is missing from school." No one said a word.

It had always been a big thing that Horatio had finally chosen to marry again, and when Claire had announced that she was pregnant, the whole lab wrapped her in cotton wool. The day that Tabitha was born, she had made her first appearance at the lab, via phone camera of course. She even learnt to walk in the break room. Grabbing their boxes, all of the team knew that it was going to be a very long day.

* * *

**Thank you so much for choosing to read my ff...**

**All i ask of you know is that you review it...even if you are only going to read this chapter**

**I really would like to know what you think...I have a 160 hits and only 4 reviews...**

**This clearly tells me that no one wants me to carry this ff on...**

**Please..review...one thing i do ask is no flames..this is my first ff..only helpfulll critisms please**


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 3**

Telling Eric that I couldn't handle the press, I opted for the video Surveillance. The photographers were beginning to play on my nerves. Taking Ryan with me, he was quite surprised at the amount of security that a middle school can have. Walking the long corridor that ran the length of the school, I looked about the classrooms, the children being nosy in general. For some reason I thought that she was probably hiding and that they couldn't find her.

"Jesus, they have photo I.D passes for a middle school. How the hell do they send here? The presidential children? When I was at school there was no I.D, well unless you counted your lunch pass. But only then it had your name on it!" As we reached the security office, I could hear the children running about outside. My stomach churned and my eyes felt hot again. I knew I had to be strong, if not for Tabitha's sake, then for my own. Knocking I expected to see some old janitor, instead a well built man, who some how I recognised, answered the door.

"Yes can I help you?"

"My name is Claire Caine and this is Ryan Wolfe. We are with the Miami Dade Crime Lab. We are investigating the disappearance of one the school's students. And you might be?" The man could have been 6ft or more, with a shaved head, that reminded me of the years I spent in Manchester, when I was younger.

"My name is Gareth Stockwell. I am the supervisor in charge of the security around here." Inviting us into his little office, I noticed that it wasn't the regular security guards hideout. There was no indecent pictures, no semi nude calendars. Standing at the back of the office there were three other men, who didn't seem as familiar. Sliding around the side of me, Gareth introduced them.

"These guys are the guards that were roistered to work Monday through to tomorrow. There is Jeff Black, Steven Peterson and Joe Fletching." Each of them acknowledging their names, I cut straight to the job in hand. It was going to take me hours to sift through the security tapes.

"Okay I am going to have to take the tapes for this morning and for the last 3 days. My colleague here is going to want plans of your walk round, your route and everything that has to be done from start of the day till the close of play." Offering to take Ryan to get the tapes and a walk round of the ground, Joe Fletching showed him out of the pokey little office.

My attention then turned back to Gareth. I was going to need everything that he knew.

"Has there been any new children start this semester? Anything out of the ordinary, that you would significantly say that was out of place at middle school?" Gareth scratched his head. It was a stupid idea amongst the population that if you scratched your head, that you would be able to remember things. It didn't work in the slightest. This guy was trying to play me.

"There is nothing sinister about this place Investigator Caine. It's a middle school. The kids at the oldest are 11. What could possibly happen that was so 'out of place'?" Lying to me was one thing that I could handle. The murderers, rapists do it all the time. But when someone tries to play me for dumb, that's' when I get bitchy.

"Mr. Stockwell, a seven year old girl has gone missing possibly been abducted from the school grounds. That doesn't strike you as 'out of place'?" Smiling at me wasn't going to help him either.

"Well there was this new teacher. Mr. Portis. He was kind of a weird fella. He didn't like mixing with the children, wasn't a teacher, just an assistant. He wouldn't patrol the school yard like the other teachers. He would just sit inside and watch them. I personally think he was a little loose in the head." This rattled me a little. New teacher and he didn't like mixing with the kids, just liked watching them? That didn't sound right at all.

"Is there anything else that you can tell me about this new teacher? What he looks like? What did he wear? Where did he come from?" turning to his desk, he dug through a large file that seemed to a permanent fixture.

"I can do one better. Here is his security form. All new teacher and assistants have to fill in once they get posted to the school. Just so we can do a check on them as well." Handing me the form, I nearly died of shock.

"When did his man join the school?" Gareth was dumbstruck. Searching his computer, he found that there was no record of him being on the system.

"I'm afraid I can't answer that Investigator, I have just come back off a 2 week vacation." Turning to his colleagues, I wanted answers and I wanted them now.

"Okay gents, if your boss wasn't around when this new teacher was welcomed into the school, which one of you did?" I wasn't going to be nice about it. Not a chance in hell.

"I was the one that gave him the form to fill out. But he never handed it back in; it came through the school's secretary. I never saw him after that." Jeff Black looked rather nervous for saying that he hadn't spoken yet.

"Mr. Black, did you see Mr. Portis this morning?" Playing with his sleeve, the man looked as anxious as a kid who had just been caught pinching the last cookie.

"Mr. Black, have you seen the new teacher at all this morning?" The pitch of my voice was slowly rising with every question I had to ask.

"He said to me that they would only be half an hour. He told me that he was taking her home that she had forgotten her gym kit and he had permission from the principal. I didn't think anything of it until they didn't come back. I knew something was wrong, that there wasn't something quite right about it, thinking about it now. See she had already had had gym class and cheerleading practise but it didn't click, till after they had left."

I didn't know whether to scream and break down in front of complete strangers, or shoot the man before me. Deciding that getting the needle wasn't a sound option. I pushed the little shit for more information. My heart beat was going full pelt, I had to calm down, but I just didn't know how to. I was talking to the man, who let a convicted paedophile and prison escapist waltz off the school ground with my daughter.

"Okay sunshine, can you tell me anything about how she was sat in the car. Was she in the front? Where were her hands? How did she look? What was the car?" I wanted to know everything.

"The car was a black SUV, Nissan I think. All the windows were down; I would have, especially with a leather interior. Anyway the young girl was sat in the rear, behind the driver. She had her hands between her legs as if she was sat on them. I didn't think; most kids sit funny when they aren't being watched. I am really sorry, truly I am." My head was spinning. This idiot had just let a convicted sex offender drive off with my daughter in the back of his car, and he thought that there was nothing wrong about that. I wanted to punch the idiot's lights in.

"Thank-you Mr. Black you have been so helpful. I am going to have to ask you, that you make a trip down to the station to make a formal statement though. Nothing to worry about, you have to just write down everything that you have just told me." Nodding in agreement, I turned away from the two men. This place was beginning to bug me and I wanted to get out. As I turned to leave the office, Jeff grabbed my arm, his eyes full of tears; he spoke in almost a sob.

"Mrs. Caine, I am so sorry that I let him take your daughter. I never meant for her to be taken. I just didn't think. Please forgive me." Telling him that he wasn't to blame, I reassured him that there was nothing for him to worry about. Flipping open my cell, I hit the speed dial for Ryan's number. Waiting after two rings, he answered.

"Wolfe?"

"It's me. Have you got something that is going to help? When you are done with the walk round, meet me out the front."

"Gotcha" Heading for the front of the school, the noise room the photographs had now gone, which was a blessing. Striding for the far corner of the yard, I shouted out to Horatio, who had been joined by Frank.

"Did you get anything from the security guards?" Handing my husband the form, his face went a very light shade of red. That colour was reserved for when he was running on the beach, or when he was extremely pissed off.

"Are you sure that this is him?" Horatio wanted to know. He was definitely going to get this SOB now.

"Ok. Frank and I are going to go on a little road trip. Claire, it's your scene. If need be go back to the lab; take Ryan see if you can catch this bastard on tape. Let Calleigh and Eric to finish up here. Call me if you get anything?"

"I have you on speed dial." Horatio was made. This day was not going to a good one for Stewart Otis

* * *

**Thank you so much for choosing to read my ff...**

**All i ask of you know is that you review it...even if you are only going to read this chapter**

**I really would like to know what you think...I have a 160 hits and only 4 reviews...**

**This clearly tells me that no one wants me to carry this ff on...**

**Please..review...one thing i do ask is no flames..this is my first ff..only helpfulll critisms please**


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

Telling Eric that I couldn't handle the press, I opted for the video Surveillance. The photographers were beginning to play on my nerves. Taking Ryan with me, he was quite surprised at the amount of security that a middle school can have. Walking the long corridor that ran the length of the school, I looked about the classrooms, the children being nosy in general. For some reason I thought that she was probably hiding and that they couldn't find her.

"Jesus, they have photo I.D passes for a middle school. How the hell do they send here? The presidential children? When I was at school there was no I.D, well unless you counted your lunch pass. But only then it had your name on it!" As we reached the security office, I could hear the children running about outside. My stomach churned and my eyes felt hot again. I knew I had to be strong, if not for Tabitha's sake, then for my own. Knocking I expected to see some old janitor, instead a well built man, who some how I recognised, answered the door.

"Yes can I help you?"

"My name is Claire Caine and this is Ryan Wolfe. We are with the Miami Dade Crime Lab. We are investigating the disappearance of one the school's students. And you might be?" The man could have been 6ft or more, with a shaved head, that reminded me of the years I spent in Manchester, when I was younger.

"My name is Gareth Stockwell. I am the supervisor in charge of the security around here." Inviting us into his little office, I noticed that it wasn't the regular security guards hideout. There was no indecent pictures, no semi nude calendars. Standing at the back of the office there were three other men, who didn't seem as familiar. Sliding around the side of me, Gareth introduced them.

"These guys are the guards that were roistered to work Monday through to tomorrow. There is Jeff Black, Steven Peterson and Joe Fletching." Each of them acknowledging their names, I cut straight to the job in hand. It was going to take me hours to sift through the security tapes.

"Okay I am going to have to take the tapes for this morning and for the last 3 days. My colleague here is going to want plans of your walk round, your route and everything that has to be done from start of the day till the close of play." Offering to take Ryan to get the tapes and a walk round of the ground, Joe Fletching showed him out of the pokey little office.

My attention then turned back to Gareth. I was going to need everything that he knew.

"Has there been any new children start this semester? Anything out of the ordinary, that you would significantly say that was out of place at middle school?" Gareth scratched his head. It was a stupid idea amongst the population that if you scratched your head, that you would be able to remember things. It didn't work in the slightest. This guy was trying to play me.

"There is nothing sinister about this place Investigator Caine. It's a middle school. The kids at the oldest are 11. What could possibly happen that was so 'out of place'?" Lying to me was one thing that I could handle. The murderers, rapists do it all the time. But when someone tries to play me for dumb, that's' when I get bitchy.

"Mr. Stockwell, a seven year old girl has gone missing possibly been abducted from the school grounds. That doesn't strike you as 'out of place'?" Smiling at me wasn't going to help him either.

"Well there was this new teacher. Mr. Portis. He was kind of a weird fella. He didn't like mixing with the children, wasn't a teacher, just an assistant. He wouldn't patrol the school yard like the other teachers. He would just sit inside and watch them. I personally think he was a little loose in the head." This rattled me a little. New teacher and he didn't like mixing with the kids, just liked watching them? That didn't sound right at all.

"Is there anything else that you can tell me about this new teacher? What he looks like? What did he wear? Where did he come from?" turning to his desk, he dug through a large file that seemed to a permanent fixture.

"I can do one better. Here is his security form. All new teacher and assistants have to fill in once they get posted to the school. Just so we can do a check on them as well." Handing me the form, I nearly died of shock.

"When did his man join the school?" Gareth was dumbstruck. Searching his computer, he found that there was no record of him being on the system.

"I'm afraid I can't answer that Investigator, I have just come back off a 2 week vacation." Turning to his colleagues, I wanted answers and I wanted them now.

"Okay gents, if your boss wasn't around when this new teacher was welcomed into the school, which one of you did?" I wasn't going to be nice about it. Not a chance in hell.

"I was the one that gave him the form to fill out. But he never handed it back in; it came through the school's secretary. I never saw him after that." Jeff Black looked rather nervous for saying that he hadn't spoken yet.

"Mr. Black, did you see Mr. Portis this morning?" Playing with his sleeve, the man looked as anxious as a kid who had just been caught pinching the last cookie.

"Mr. Black, have you seen the new teacher at all this morning?" The pitch of my voice was slowly rising with every question I had to ask.

"He said to me that they would only be half an hour. He told me that he was taking her home that she had forgotten her gym kit and he had permission from the principal. I didn't think anything of it until they didn't come back. I knew something was wrong, that there wasn't something quite right about it, thinking about it now. See she had already had had gym class and cheerleading practise but it didn't click, till after they had left."

I didn't know whether to scream and break down in front of complete strangers, or shoot the man before me. Deciding that getting the needle wasn't a sound option. I pushed the little shit for more information. My heart beat was going full pelt, I had to calm down, but I just didn't know how to. I was talking to the man, who let a convicted paedophile and prison escapist waltz off the school ground with my daughter.

"Okay sunshine, can you tell me anything about how she was sat in the car. Was she in the front? Where were her hands? How did she look? What was the car?" I wanted to know everything.

"The car was a black SUV, Nissan I think. All the windows were down; I would have, especially with a leather interior. Anyway the young girl was sat in the rear, behind the driver. She had her hands between her legs as if she was sat on them. I didn't think; most kids sit funny when they aren't being watched. I am really sorry, truly I am." My head was spinning. This idiot had just let a convicted sex offender drive off with my daughter in the back of his car, and he thought that there was nothing wrong about that. I wanted to punch the idiot's lights in.

"Thank-you Mr. Black you have been so helpful. I am going to have to ask you, that you make a trip down to the station to make a formal statement though. Nothing to worry about, you have to just write down everything that you have just told me." Nodding in agreement, I turned away from the two men. This place was beginning to bug me and I wanted to get out. As I turned to leave the office, Jeff grabbed my arm, his eyes full of tears; he spoke in almost a sob.

"Mrs. Caine, I am so sorry that I let him take your daughter. I never meant for her to be taken. I just didn't think. Please forgive me." Telling him that he wasn't to blame, I reassured him that there was nothing for him to worry about. Flipping open my cell, I hit the speed dial for Ryan's number. Waiting after two rings, he answered.

"Wolfe?"

"It's me. Have you got something that is going to help? When you are done with the walk round, meet me out the front."

"Gotcha" Heading for the front of the school, the noise room the photographs had now gone, which was a blessing. Striding for the far corner of the yard, I shouted out to Horatio, who had been joined by Frank.

"Did you get anything from the security guards?" Handing my husband the form, his face went a very light shade of red. That colour was reserved for when he was running on the beach, or when he was extremely pissed off.

"Are you sure that this is him?" Horatio wanted to know. He was definitely going to get this SOB now.

"Ok. Frank and I are going to go on a little road trip. Claire, it's your scene. If need be go back to the lab; take Ryan see if you can catch this bastard on tape. Let Calleigh and Eric to finish up here. Call me if you get anything?"

"I have you on speed dial." Horatio was made. This day was not going to a good one for Stewart Otis

* * *

**Thank you so much for choosing to read my ff...**

**All i ask of you know is that you review it...even if you are only going to read this chapter**

**I really would like to know what you think...I have a 160 hits and only 4 reviews...**

**This clearly tells me that no one wants me to carry this ff on...**

**Please..review...one thing i do ask is no flames..this is my first ff..only helpfulll critisms please**


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

With Frank and Horatio leaving the scene, I went to see what Eric and Calleigh had found. Eric was loading evidence in to the back of the SUV. It was taking its toll on all of us. Eric adored Tabitha and vice versa. She was a proper Uncle's little girl.

"Hey, you get anything special from the school yard?" Handing me an evidence bag, inside was a silver necklace. It looked almost identical to Tabitha's Virgin Mary.

"Eric, are you sure it's hers? Can you really be sure?" looking at me with his Chocolate brown eyes, I knew that there was no point trying to convince myself otherwise. Tabitha had been brought that buy Eric the day that she as christened. It originally hung over her crib as a baby and above her bed when she was a toddler. It was only in the last few months that she asked if she could wear it.

"I also found tyre marks on the yard. I took photos from every angle. The impression was too light to pick up." Informing him that Ryan and I were heading back to the lab, I went in search of my best friend, who was interviewing the principal. This kind of school ran on popularity and word of mouth. Calleigh had known the principal in a familiar light, as he was her next door neighbour.

"Chris, we are going to need everything that you can give us. The teachers that saw Tabitha this morning, the students that had direct contact with her, anything that is going to help with our investigation." The man, who was greying slightly round the edges, stood a foot taller than Calleigh. He had an air of posh schooling, possibly a Harvard graduate himself.

I had only spoken to the man on parent teacher night, which had been rather interesting. Horatio and I had gone thinking that Tabitha was struggling with school, instead we were told that she was doing extremely well and that it was quite possible for her to progress above her peers. Interrupting their conversation, I handed Chris the file on Stewart Otis, who was posing at Mr. David Portis.

"What can you tell me about this teacher Mr. Fields?" Searching through the file, his face drew a blank. He had probably see hundreds of teachers files similar to this one.

"Nothing out of the ordinary investigator, why do you ask?" He was playing dumb and doing a really bad job of it.

"Shall I tell you what is wrong with this profile?" Almost snatching the file back, I flicked to the section where finger prints and photographs are required by the teacher.

"See this page? You say that nothing appears to be wrong with it. But when my colleague runs these prints through IAFIS, they are not going to come back Mr. David Portis. Do you know why they are not going to come back Mr. David Portis?" The man just stared at me. "They are not going to come back Mr. David Portis, because the man doesn't exist!" The principal scoffed at me, I could have dropped him there and then.

"Investigator, I have access to databases that allow us to check and authenticate the teachers who wish to work here. I don't see where this is leading."

"Do you remember a little over 9 years ago, a six year old was kidnapped from a child's play pen in front of numerous members of the public and the child's own mother?"

"No, I'm sorry; I can't say that I recall that far back."

"Well let me enlighten you as to what happened. The child had been playing quite happily with other children. She had been ill for a few days, for which her mother had given antibiotics to counter the illness. Now while she was playing in the pen, a nice man with candy came and took her away. Stewart Otis had drugged the cotton candy, to make the child placid and willing to co-operate. Now before this fiend could abuse the poor girl, she died as a result of the mixture of the drug Otis had given her and the antibiotics her mother had given her." The man stood there, moved by the story.

"I still don't see what that had got to do with my teacher?

"Mr. David Portis is Stewart Otis. He escaped from his incarceration after a year, where he was waiting to be executed. Now he doesn't particularly like my husband or his team at this moment in time, as he was charged for other murders and sexual assaults, for which his sentenced was reduced to L.W.O.P. Now this sounds all nice and dandy, we catch the bad guy and everything goes back to normal but a few years ago Otis got out for a second time. He was on the rampage for just over 6 months, when we once again stuck him back in his six by six. He always warned that he would be out for revenge, targeting the one person that put him on death row, which was my husband" Waving the file in the man's face, I did something that I had never done before. I threatened an innocent person.

"If Stewart Otis has my daughter because of your incompetence as a principal, to vet for sexual predators, I will personally see that this school is shut for good." The principal's expression had changed numerous times during my little speech. He now knew that I wasn't playing around.

"Investigator Caine, I thought that as his finger prints came back clean, there was nothing to worry about. I never thought that anything like this would ever happen. I am truly sorry. I really am." I had had enough of people telling me that they were truly sorry.

"Well let's hope for your school's sake that my daughter is found and that nothing has happened to her, otherwise there will be a whole lot of trouble. I hope that I am clear."

* * *

**Thank you so much for choosing to read my ff...**

**All i ask of you know is that you review it...even if you are only going to read this chapter**

**I really would like to know what you think...I have a 160 hits and only 4 reviews...**

**This clearly tells me that no one wants me to carry this ff on...**

**Please..review...one thing i do ask is no flames..this is my first ff..only helpfulll critisms please**


End file.
